DA urges Coatesville Area school officials to cooperate

Chester County’s District Attorney Monday broke his office’s relative silence on the ongoing investigation of the Coatesville Area School District with a warning that school board members must start cooperating with authorities while acknowledging the district’s solicitor is the focus of a criminal probe.

District Attorney Tom Hogan issued a statement Monday afternoon that criticized the school board and its legal representation for failing to fully cooperate with the investigation. Hogan also lodged accusations of witness intimidation.

Hogan said the school board and Ellison have made apparent attempts to obstruct, evade, and delay the criminal investigation. The District Attorney said the district has delayed and refused to provide investigators with basic documents and have made attempts to block district employees and representatives from providing information.

“There is an easy way and a hard way for (the district) to deal with this investigation. The (Coatesville Area School) Board can cooperate fully, help to discover any crimes and allow the truth to be exposed,” Hogan said. “Or the (Coatesville Area School) Board can fight the investigation, attempt to cover up any misconduct, and try to hide the truth. At the end of the day, the commonwealth will discover the full truth. The only question is whether the (school board) will help or hinder that process.”

The district has been mired in controversy since the first week of the school year, when former Superintendent Richard Como and former high school Director of Athletics and Activities Jim Donato abruptly resigned after racist and sexist text message exchanges were discovered on their district-issued cell phones. Public outrage that was initially directed at the two disgraced former administrators was later aimed at the school board and its legal representation in reaction to the district’s handling of the situation.

Hogan’s statement, issued out of what sources have described as continued frustration with the level of cooperation from the school district, also identified solicitor James Ellison and his Harrisburg law firm Rhoads & Sinon as subjects of an investigation into potential criminal conduct.

School board president Neil Campbell released a statement late Monday night in response to Hogan’s public comments that insisted the district has cooperated fully with the investigation.

“This board, acting on the advice of our counsel, will continue to provide information and continue to fully cooperate as we have been doing since the outset,” said school board president Neil Campbell. “We are disappointed by the District Attorney’s statement but, nonetheless, we owe it to our students, their families and all taxpayers to do everything we can to address the questions and concerns that have been raised.”

The district voluntarily provided the district attorney’s office with Como and Donato’s phones, including documents requested by the District Attorney’s Office, as well as making sure steps were taken to secure electronic files by hiring a third party IT firm, according to Campbell.

Furthermore, the statement claimed the school board “pledged to conduct an internal investigation and that effort continues.”

School board members and Ellison originally pledged “full cooperation” with the commonwealth’s investigation, but Monday’s statement from Hogan indicated the district has “fallen far short” of that pledge.

“They have taken steps to harass, intimidate, and bully the whistle-blowers who initially reported the wrongdoing,” the statement said. “None of this conduct will derail this investigation, but it gives the appearance to all involved that CASD and its Solicitor have no interest in allowing the truth to be uncovered.”

The District Attorney’s Office also urged the school board to voluntarily provide all documents related to legal bills and expenses paid to Ellison and Rhoads & Sinon, indicating the records are necessary to determine whether taxpayer funds were used illegally.

The district, through Ellison and his firm, is currently conducting a legal review of several Right-to-Know requests filed by the Daily Local News for all payments made to Rhoads & Sinon since the firm was hired as the district’s legal representation and for the terms of Ellison’s contract.

Hogan also said Rhoads & Sinon is no longer in an acceptable position to represent the district due to the investigation into the firm’s conduct.

“Because the Solicitor and his law firm are now being investigated for their own conduct, the Solicitor and his firm have a legal conflict of interest, and may no longer represent (Coatesville Area School District) in this investigation,” the statement said. The district “must appoint independent counsel who can assist (the district) and Coatesville taxpayers in uncovering any unlawful conduct that took place in the school district.”

Hogan’s statement came several days after multiple district administrators and one school board member was spotted at the Chester County Justice Center amid reports that an investigative grand jury has convened in the wake of the texting scandal.

Acting Superintendent Angelo Romaniello, Acting Assistant Superintendent Teresa Powell, Director of Technology Abdallah Hawa, and school board member Tonya Thames Taylor were all seen inside the courthouse last Thursday. Powell and Hawa’s attorney, Samuel Stretton of West Chester, told the Daily Local News that his clients, the two whistle-blowers who helped uncover the offensive text message exchanges, were issued subpoenas and ordered to testify before an investigative grand jury.

The District Attorney’s Office has repeatedly declined to confirm the existence of the grand jury investigation. Monday’s statement was the first time Hogan or representatives of his office commented on the nature of the ongoing criminal investigation, which Hogan has acknowledged predated the discovery of the text messages.

After reviewing Hogan’s statement Monday Romaniello’s private attorney, Robert J. Donatoni of West Chester, expressed hope that that district attorney’s call for the removal of Rhoads & Sinon would allow the investigation and its subsequent court proceedings to move forward.

“It’s unfortunate that any lawyer or law firm would find themselves in this position. I am not privy to all the information the DA has related to this perceived conflict and any possible misconduct, but having said that, based on what I have seen and experienced, if this law firm is removed from representing this school board, it should make the representation of those of us who represent individuals like Dr. Romaniello more effective, because we are not handicapped by the perhaps conflicting and competing interests of other parties who may have a different agenda,” Donatoni told the Daily Local News.

Hogan’s statement appeared to strengthen Stretton’s previous allegations that his clients faced continued harassment at the hands of Ellison and Romaniello after they came forward and reported the text messages. Stretton has issued two letters to school board members containg accusations that Hawa and Powell were harassed and had their regular duties restricted after the pair provided transcripts of the messages to the District Attorney’s Office and later to the Daily Local News. Stretton, and later the Chester County Demcratic Committee, called for the removal of Romaniello and Ellison.

Both Powell and Hawa said they believed members of the school board, including Taylor, not only attempted to cover up the text message exchanges, but were also prepared to allow Como and Donato to remain in their positions after transcripts of the conversations were provided to district officials.

The school board has maintained its members acted in the best interests of the district and denied accusations of a cover-up, though several have stated that the board never intended to make the messages public.

Some board members have publicly alluded that the Daily Local News has only reporting one side of the story. But when asked to comment on numerous occasions throughout the coverage of the texting scandal, board members have either failed to respond or referred requests for comments to Ellison.

When board members have responded to inquiries for comment, the statements were published.

Objections over the district’s high legal fees have also exacerbated criticism of Ellison and his firm. According to the district’s financial reports, Rhoads & Sinon has collected around $4 million in legal fees from the district since February 2010.

However school board president Neil Campbell has not only defended the district’s high legal costs, he said the district witnessed a significant amount of savings over the years with Ellison as its legal representative.

According to Campbell, the district saved about $4.6 million since 2008, including $1.4 million in savings involving disputes over special education matters, an additional $1.4 million in disputes over real estate assessment appeals and legal fees from revoking Graystone Academy Charter School’s charter.

In addition to what the district is saving in legal fees, Campbell said Rhoads & Sinon charges the district $180 per hour, raising the fee $20 per hour in the past 10 years.

“The taxpayers of this district have been very well served by our solicitor. We take very seriously our commitment to use taxpayers’ dollars effectively and I’m very confident that our solicitor’s legal representation has produced significant savings for our district and all taxpayers,” Campbell said in a statement issued two weeks ago.

But the district’s legal fees appear much higher than those paid in other comparable districts. According to officials in the West Chester Area School District, that district paid about $412,900 in legal fees during the entire 2012-13 fiscal year. However about $103,470.21 of that cost was paid to a lead negotiator who was hired on the school board’s behalf in June 2012 to handle the ongoing labor negotiations with the district’s teachers.

During the 2011-12 fiscal year the West Chester Area School District paid about $308,400 in legal fees, an average of about $25,700 per month. In the 2010-11 fiscal year the district paid about $326,800 in legal fees, an average of $27,200 a month.

On Monday Hogan urged school board members to begin cooperating with investigators as they review Rhoads & Sinon’s billing history.

“Sometimes the best way to get out of a hole is to put down the shovel and stop digging,” Hogan said.